His views are contrary to the widely-accepted model of the Universe in which time is an illusion and the laws of physics are fixed, as held by Einstein and many contemporary physicists as well as some ancient philosophers. Acknowledging that his statements were provocative, he explained how he had come to change his mind about the nature of reality and had moved away from the idea that the assumptions that apply to observations in a laboratory can be extrapolated to the whole Universe. The debate had sometimes taken a metaphysical turn in which the idea that time is not real had led some to conclude that everything that humans value, such as free will, imagination and agency, is also an illusion. “Is it any wonder that so many people don’t buy science? This is what is at stake”, he said. Prof. Smolin’s talk drew on his new book, Time Reborn: from the crisis of physics to the future of the universe. He is a founding faculty member at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Toronto. A video of the full lecture will be coming to the IOP YouTube channel soon.

The following is an extract of a lecture given by theoretical physicist Lee Smolin at IOP on 22 May 2013. Drawing from his new book, Time Reborn, Smolin challenges the notion of time in established naturalism. He goes on to explain how the great unsolved problems in physics and cosmology may be solved by adopting the view of a real time. http://www.timereborn.com